Raine Maida of Our Lady Peace

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Recently I was able to schedule a Zoom call with the lead vocalist of Canadian rock band Our Lady Peace, Raine Maida, for an in-depth discussion largely around the topic of mental health awareness. Our Lady Peace recently reissued and re-recorded a version of their fan-favorite song, “Whatever,” that was originally used as a theme song for a former WWE wrestler. In this interview, Raine and I chatted about how Our Lady Peace “reclaimed” this key song in their discography, and what’s coming down the road next for this legendary rock band. If you’re looking to stay connected with Our Lady Peace, please consider joining their Discord here.

Thank you so much for your time today, Raine. Our Lady Peace recently released a cool new version of “Whatever” as a tribute to mental health awareness and suicide prevention. So why’d you feel the need to contribute to this worthy cause?

Well, it’s one of these circumstances where we were asked to write and record a song for Chris Benoit, the <former> WWE wrestler. And unfortunately, soon after that song came out, this terrible tragedy/suicide happened with Chris. And we didn’t play that song. We stopped playing it. We hardly ever played it, to be honest. But as we were launching this OLP 30 tour in Canada, and just wanted to have fans input, in terms of, “hey, this is a big deal. We want to get you guys help pick the set list,” and “Whatever” kept coming up as this song people wanted to hear, and it’s literally our number two most-streamed song in America since the DSP started. So I just started talking to fans, through DMs and saying, “Well, it’s kind of a very touchy thing. I don’t know if we feel right playing the song…” and there were a couple fans that had some really profound, thoughtful comments in terms of, well, this will help shed a light on mental health. And we’ve come a long way. I was like, “You know what? That actually sounds good to me.“

So I kind of presented the idea to the band in that light. It’s like, “hey, if we can re-record this song, I can change some of the lyrics, so it puts a little bit more positive spin, talks a little bit about mental health. This is something maybe we should consider.” We did <the recording with> Nick Rocklin, who produced a few of these new songs for us, Foo Fighters, and Deftones. We were natural with him. I said, let’s get Nick to do it. And so we did it, and now being able to talk about it before we play it is amazing. Because fans are people who are really reacting and cheering, because, yes, we’re donating all proceeds to the suicide hotline and mental health awareness. But I think the idea of ending stigma, the idea of not suffering in silence, obviously people like Chris did, and it’s just resonating. I think we’re at that moment in time where it’s like…everyone’s got something going on. It’s a tough world. It’s tough for kids out there. Social media is not helping. So the idea that we can vocalize it at a live show. I’m just really blown away by the response. So I’m really happy we did it.

Yeah, and you approached it the right way by asking for fan feedback, asking almost like permission, so to speak, to kind of “reclaim” that song. Do you feel like that was the right process for you guys?

It was exactly what you said…the fans helped us reclaim this song, which I’m so proud of. Because they’re truly a part of it.

Yeah, so you guys have been a band for over 30 years, with 10 studio albums, and it’s just a remarkable feat for you guys. What keeps you motivated to keep the Our Lady Peace bandwagon alive?

I mean, it’s really new music. It’s that curiosity. I think if this was just like, “hey, you guys can go do this tour, and you’ll just play the hits and do the nostalgia <thing>,” I don’t think anyone’s really interested in that, to be honest. I think connecting new songs to old songs is hugely important to us. The reaction to the new songs has been great, and knowing that everyone’s jonesing us to get in the studio and record a bunch of other new material…I think that the live shows are great, but it’s knowing that if we didn’t have that idea of there’s going to be new music, how do we progress our sound? How do we keep pushing? We’ve never been a band that have been rinse and repeat, maybe through a detriment, I’m sure, to our record company, to be like, “Why didn’t you just write ‘Somewhere Out There, Part Two’, and why didn’t you just repeat Clumsy,but we’ve never done that. So I think that that really keeps it fresh for us, and I think it keeps everyone engaged.

And I appreciate that about your band, too.

Thank you.

The fact that you guys are willing to try new things as artists is what kept me a fan for so long, too, and still to this day, of course.

Yeah, that means a lot!

No problem. Yeah, I actually live in the DC area, and I’ve caught you guys at the 9:30 Club many, many times.

Oh, cool! It’s funny, we’re just running a headlining tour for the winter, and we’re trying to figure out, because this tour was in Baltimore, which was great, but we haven’t played DC for a while, so definitely, definitely going to stop in there.

Baltimore is not too far from me, and my concert buddy is also from the Baltimore City area, too. Yeah, we’ve checked out a lot of the shows with him from college on.

Very cool!

Yes, and you guys also did a sequel to Spiritual Machines in 2021. What’d you learn from this process of revisiting old material, while still looking to the future by putting a new spin on it?

Yeah, I think that first Spiritual Machine record’s like so uncanny, right? No, we didn’t invent it. But, Ray Kurzweil, through his book “The Age of Spiritual Meeting, “was talking about AI, 20 years ago. So the fact that that’s all anyone’s talking about it now is amazing. I think 90% of his predictions in that book and some of the stuff that we talk about in the album, came true. So I just felt like, you know what? It’s been a minute. Ray’s got a new book coming out. Let’s get Ray again, and let’s do Part Two and figure out what’s going to happen in the next 20 years. But it’s funny, because the crazy thing, Adam, is that I don’t think Ray <being on> Spiritual Machines was a big deal when it came out, and a lot of people talked about it in his new book. I don’t feel like people talk about it as much, because it’s really positive. The predictions he’s making are like AI, and all the technological advances are going to wipe out world hunger. It’s going to help climate change. It’s going to help so many things, in terms of poverty and all these different things. But that’s not what we want as a society and a culture. We’re much more attracted to the scorched-earth, Terminator, kind of dystopian future stuff. So I’m betting on Ray because those things are much more…not as dark but we’ll see. I’m glad we did another one, because again, if he’s as smart as he was with AI, the future is bright.

Yeah, and what’s your take on the whole political climate right now? Things are getting crazy, as you can probably hear in the news. What advice would you give for people trying to stay grounded in their mental health?

That’s a great question. I’m not too shy to say that I’ve distanced myself from all that stuff, because some of the stuff I’m involved in, it includes politics in terms of policies that are being passed, and all this different stuff. But I find if you get into the weeds of that stuff, and you’re in it, and it’s consuming your days, and you’re getting into these echo chambers on social media and stuff…no matter who you’re following, it’s negative. Because it’s pitting you against someone else, and so this whole divisive kind of property of it all…when I finally stopped watching any news, I scrubbed my whole feeds on social media from any news and so on, on both sides. So I just feel like whatever is relevant to my life and I need to take care of myself, I’m much happier able to do that. It’s not a selfish thing, I talk about mental health on stage every day. We’re doing that stuff, but I feel like I’m a much better person from not letting it overtake my life.

And what general guidance would you give to people that are so absorbed by social media, but are trying to distance themselves as much as they can from their phones?

Yeah, you have to understand that they’re all meant to…it’s a race to the bottom. So, once you start to realize that, and I think for me, the flip is starting to understand it’s all these companies, I don’t care if it’s Fox or CNN or Instagram, they are all making money off our headspace. So, once you think of it like that, and you’re not making money off them, it’s the reverse. Don’t give them yourself. Don’t give them everything. If there’s something we have control of, it’s our attention spans. And why give that much attention to something that really doesn’t care about you? I try to keep it as simple as that.

Yeah, that’s a great way of framing it too, because it’s such a heavy-loaded question. When you look back at some of the key album anniversaries that kind of go gone over time, how do you honor your past, with either vinyl reissues, stuff like that, with the things that you can control?

You know what’s funny? I think playing live is one of the biggest ways that we were able to do that. Changing <up the> sets every night. But I think, hopefully you get to see us in the new year, the band is better than ever. It’s still very punk rock in the terms of the intention we bring on stage. But there’s also gratitude, and I think that just makes for this really incredible show every night. And so I mean, we’re constantly working on things, we pay attention to everything, and our new merch designs, I think are the best we’ve ever had. And people are really digging it. We’re talking about reissues, a box set of all our vinyl, really trying to honor the past, but also make it feel fresh. And at the end of the day, I still go back to seeing us live, it is kind of like a litmus test for this band. It’s how we judge ourselves as well. I love the new music we do have. We’re going to keep recording in the fall and put out more songs, and then eventually it’ll be an album, and we’ll press the vinyl as well. But I think just feeling and keeping that curiosity, I think fans can sense that in a way, as opposed to the rinse and repeat stuff.

And you’re also on a summer tour with a couple other bands, right? Collective Soul, and a couple others, right?

Yeah, plus Live.

So how’s that been going, and how are you kind of tailoring the set list with so much great material to choose from?

I mean, because we’re not handling those shows, we’re not playing as long. So we’re just trying to give a little bit of everything. If all we’re doing is playing “Whatever” again, I say it because I speak before that song, I’m blown away by the reaction of the audience to the mental health spot of it. So I feel like this tour was a great launching pad for that song and just telling the story. And so we’re going to continue to tell that story, but it’s pretty amazing to watch and hear audiences be so open. You asked about politics. That is a mental health issue, and getting too involved in it on a day to day basis is not great for mental health. And I think that’s what I’m feeling in the audience. When I start talking about it’s like, “hey, we all need to be able to reach out to our friends or family, but there’s no reason to suffer in silence.” And the training for mental health is kind of like if you’re having a heart attack, or you’re in crisis, you’re going to call 911. But, if you feel that <crisis> in your head and your brain, there’s no shame in calling 911.

Absolutely. Yeah, I’m a big proponent for mental health awareness too for anybody that’s looking for guidance. I mean, I’m only 42 years old now, but still, I’ve lived enough life that I could give people guidance along the way too.

Oh my god, yeah, for sure.

So could you talk a little bit about some of your favorite memories of some of the key records you guys made? I mean, obviously Clumsy is the one that people want to listen to more often than not. But Gravity, I thought, was outstanding. Burn Burn was another one that was a late-career record that I really gravitated towards. Can you think of other other memories that kind of stuck with you over time?

Yeah, it’s funny. I don’t want to say super fans, but we have a hardcore fan base that Spiritual Machines has always been their favorite record. And we were able to take this futuristic vibe with music. I think, even sonically, we started to really experiment a little bit more with “Send Stuff” and and having “Raised Voice” on that record, I think it just definitely not any of our biggest singles on that record, like you said from Gravity or Clumsy, but the idea that we had Ray Kurzweil speak in between songs on that record…he’ll go down as one of the leading futurists on the planet. And as AI comes into fruition here now, he was the guy that was talking about it 25 years ago and saying, “watch out. This is going to happen.” And I think the same thing is going to happen with singularity over the next five years, where it’s like you’re going to have a robot pass the Turing Test, where you can’t tell if it’s human or robotic, right? So, I mean, just as a music fan and a technology fan, the fact that I have that dude on the record…and we’re friends with him. And he made another record and spoke again. That’s a highlight, for sure.

But then of course, I remember when our first record, Naveed, came out, we’re touring. I just told the story to someone from Collective Soul the other day, because we were playing in Boston, and we were just starting to get our own fans to buy tickets to these little club shows. We’re playing the Middle East, and I think we almost sold it out, and it was so exciting for us, and our tour manager walks in, and he’s like, “we got to tear down…” We were about to do a sound check. He goes, “we’ve got to tear down.” I was like, “Oh my God, what happened?” And he goes, “Well, actually, we noticed the show’s almost sold out, but Robert Plant was in his limousine in New York, and heard ‘Starseed’ on the radio, and immediately called the label and said, ‘I need this band to open up for us, and the tour starts tomorrow in Indianapolis,’ so we have to tear down and give it him.” And so I hate to admit it, but at first, I said, “no way.” Like, these are people that bought tickets to see us. This is starting to happen. He was like, “I get it, but we’re going.” And he was right, because you know what we learned? Robert Plant came up to me like a true gentleman, and told me how much he loved the lyrics to the album, the sound and everything. I was like, “what???” But also opening up for him, that’s an experience that we’ll never forget, and really enriched us as artists. I wasn’t even a huge Zeppelin fan, but they opened up with, “Thank You,” and it just brought tears to my eyes. I was like, “oh my goodness, this is incredible.” So, I could do this for hours, but we’ve been really blessed.

That’s awesome. I have never heard that story either! That’s really cool to hear about, and how you saw the best of that opportunity, but also reflected on your fans’ perspective from that too. That keeps you pretty grounded, I’m sure.

Yeah, I don’t mind telling that story, because I think any young musician wants to build their own career. And the fact that you had people, even if it was only 250 people that bought tickets, I was like, “No, I don’t want to let them down…” But I’m glad we had management. It’s like sorry, guys, but we’re going to Indianapolis. <Laughter>

<Laughter> That’s cool. Any last words for fans or things that they can look forward to? You teased a couple different things about recording new material, a vinyl box set, and stuff like that, but anything else for fans to kind of stay in tune to?

I mean, this tour that we’re just putting together the routing. Honestly, we’re talking about should we play Baltimore or DC? And talking about some of the other clubs in DC. So we are coming back in early-2026 and we are so excited to do it. We haven’t done a headline tour down the US for a minute, so I cannot wait to get out back on the road.

Hell yeah, I’ll be there!

Awesome, man! We’ll connect again for sure. Let’s grab a drink or something, Adam.

That’d be awesome! I appreciate you. Take care, Raine!

Thanks, man!

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